Chapter Text
Sabo was not used to stacks of paper on his desk. He preferred piles sliding off of one another, many of them not on his desk at all but scattered across his office. Koala called him a slob; he called it tactical organized chaos. If no one in the Revolutionary Army but him could make sense of his desk, surely an intruder would be completely helpless in the face of his organizational system. No one else could find anything, let alone put things back where they were before. Sabo knew where everything was, and wasn’t that the important thing?
But here was a neat little stack. That was the other nice thing about his system; he could immediately identify anything new left in his office, because they were left in the middle of his desk in even, squared-off stacks. It was shorter than the usual paperwork deliveries. Typed, not handwritten; also unusual. On closer inspection, it appeared to be a stack of letters tied together with a thin ribbon. Fancy. Bizarre.
He shrugged, undid the ribbon, and opened the letter on top. It was from the editor of the Blueberry Times. Something about mail for their newest columnist, forwarding them to the listed addresses, the staff of the newspaper could not be held responsible for anything contained therein due to respecting his privacy by not opening his mail, blah blah blah.
Sabo pushed a pile of unfiled reports off of his chair and sat down with a growing smile. This would be fun.
There was a letter from the Dancing Donkey Tavern noting the growing popularity of their business since he wrote about it and inviting him back. He made a mental note to burn that one; if someone found out they were expecting him, they’d be less likely to send him on missions near Shore. Like hell he’d pass up the chance for more of those dumplings.
There was—ah, his first death threat. You’re that bastard that got my sweet boy sent to jail, aren’t you? You can change the name of his noble vessel to something so undignified as Boaty McBoatface, but you can’t fool me, mister! I’ll have you know that slavery is perfectly legal in this region. When the people I’ve hired find you—and Sabo was already beyond done with this bullshit.
There was a wannabe-editor. Please reference my itemized list below for inconsistencies between your account of Meradoc and my knowledge as a lifelong resident and expert on the island. The self-proclaimed expert was not from the village Sabo had written about and did not appear to have ever been there.
There was a handwritten note in huge, clunky letters, many of which were backwards. It read, tHanck yu for mayking my DaD laff, and most of the sheet of paper consisted of doodled smiles. Sabo placed that one in his Keep Forever Pile.
There was—aww, his second death threat! This one was from Kaido—or more likely, someone from his crew pretending to be writing on his behalf. The first article, the one that was accidentally published, was about an island in the Beast Pirates’ territory, and Sabo had… meddled ever so slightly in Kaido’s business. He doubted that his work had truly caught the emperor’s attention, but still, that one also ended up in the Keep Forever Pile. He’d frame it and hang it up if it wasn’t a security risk to so obviously declare himself to be A. O. Iboushi.
There was—
Oh. Oh dear.
If you don’t change my name from Wombat, I will kill you. :)
For no particular reason, Sabo decided to avoid Koala for as long as humanly possible.
(He also decided not to change the name.)